A Tale of Two Lokis, Chapter 8
Jan. 29th, 2012 10:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
persephone_koreTitle: A Tale of Two Lokis
Authors: Khilari and Persephone_Kore
Summary: Thor and Loki were not the first of Odin's loved ones to bear those names. After the events of the movie, Loki is planning his next moves when he discovers a frost giant imprisoned in a volcano, who proves to be both the uncle he was named for and Laufey's first child. Soon Loki has a new mentor, Asgard is shaking off isolationist tendencies, Jotunheim is receiving foreign aid, and Earth is suddenly and vividly reacquainted with the existence of aliens....
Authors' Note: We were partially inspired by some of the theories proposed on the TV Tropes WMG page for the movie. We have taken the movie and combined it with the Eddas, the Gesta Danorum, and bits and pieces from other Marvel sources. We're having a lot of fun with it and hope you enjoy the result.
Chapter Eight
It was with some regret that Loki decided he now knew how to use the falconskin and it was time to move to stage two - dismantling it. He’d been expecting that part of things to be difficult, and was stubbornly ignoring the thought that if Odin had failed he had no chance. What he hadn’t expected it to involve was so much preparation.
‘We need to rent a workshop? Really?’ he asked. They had already rented a new apartment and he’d expected to be able to work from there.
Lopt shrugged. ‘It will be easier somewhere proof against extreme temperatures. We’ll have to use the casket extensively and it’s possible the defenses will use fire.’ When Loki looked disbelieving Lopt grinned, one of those expressions which still looked completely wrong on a frost giant face. ‘It’s a major export item and usually sold to magic adepts. The defenses aren’t as much of an overkill as they seem.’
Loki conceded the point and went looking for jewellery workshops to rent. He also acceded to Lopt’s insistence on leather aprons, leather gloves and safety goggles although not without complaining.
‘Are the goggles really necessary?’ he asked. ‘I’m sure you and Odin didn’t use them.’
‘Because they hadn’t been invented at the time. I’m all for taking advantage of mortal ingenuity, especially if it stops things trying to blind me,’ said Lopt. ‘This is going to be difficult enough without leaving ourselves vulnerable on purpose.’
Which was perfectly true and enough to carry the argument. The argument about glamours didn’t even need to be spoken. Loki was less than thrilled about the idea of spending long periods of time without one but knew the casket was their best chance of success, so as soon as they had the door to the workshop locked they both dropped the glamours they had been wearing on the way. Loki pulled on the gloves with a feeling of relief that it would stop him having to see his own hands.
Lopt put the falconskin, just the pendant since the chain was apparently unimportant, on the workbench and put their toolbox on the next bench over. As well as renting a jewellery workshop they had also bought some jewellers’ hand tools; the workshop didn’t come with them included and, in any case, Lopt had thrown a rather startling amount of magic into some of them.
‘Right,’ said Lopt. ‘The first layer of magic is self-destructive. If we get it wrong the whole thing will fuse. Fortunately, I remember how to do that after getting that far with, oh, about fifty falconskins over the years.’
Lopt pulled out a small, but thoroughly bespelled, metal punch and a hammer and put them next to the falconskin on the bench. He ran one finger from the top of the pendant to the bottom, murmuring spells as he did. Loki listened hard, trying to memorise them. Then Lopt picked up the punch, placed it carefully on the surface of the pendant, and tapped it lightly with the hammer. Cracks spread over the surface of the falconskin, but very geometric cracks. The final effect was something like a puzzle box; you could see how many tiny, intricate shapes went to make up the whole.
Lopt put the punch aside with a quick breath of relief. ‘And now for the tricky bit,’ he said, sounding positively gleeful about the prospect. ‘There are three types of pieces here, pieces that work the falconskin, pieces that serve as security and pieces that do both.’
Loki nodded.
‘The best thing to do is deactivate pieces with security measures before removing them. Which means analysing everything very carefully before doing anything at all, since the touch of magic will activate them. Mostly it’s going to be a long, slow process. And sometimes we’re going to miss something and activate a piece. Some of them might activate when you remove their neighbours, sometimes we’ll have gotten the deactivation spell wrong. Some might pretend to be just function pieces and then turn out to have hidden security measures.’ Lopt paused and looked across at Loki. ‘At that point you have until it goes active to analyse it and break the spellwork. Or rather I do, your job is to slow the spell down.’
‘How?’ said Loki. He was starting to feel more excited about this than he had about flying, similar to the feeling of first exploring the ways by himself. Doing something that should probably be impossible, was certainly going to be dangerous, and knowing he was going to do his absolute best to pull it off. Did Thor felt like this before a battle, he wondered, before frowning and pushing the stray thought aside to focus on Lopt.
‘It’s going to be a judgement call,’ admitted Lopt. ‘In most cases just throw your will at it and back that up with the casket. In some cases it can be set up to resist or reflect strong magic and you’ll have to go for a lighter touch. If it doesn’t seem to be working, adjust your tactics. If you can’t hold it and it looks seriously dangerous then destroy it - you probably won’t have time to ask me in that situation. Try not to do that too much, though. We can afford to lose security only pieces, but not function ones.’
‘I understand,’ said Loki. ‘Should I summon the casket now?’
Lopt shook his head. ‘Summon it when we’re ready to remove something. For now let’s pick a piece and get started on analysing it.’
It was just as long and slow a process as Lopt had promised. Hours of analysis that were part magical theory test, part logic puzzle, followed by Lopt carefully implementing the deactivation spell they’d designed and then pulling the piece out with needle-nosed pliers, while Loki stood by with the casket between his hands and both of them tried to remember to breathe.
It was a few days before they slipped up. Instead of the normal slight fading feeling the deactivation triggered a burst of magic. Loki responded almost before he’d had time to finish the thought, pushing it back down. It felt like trying to hold an explosion back with his hands but, startlingly, he was winning. Lopt murmured a frantic string of words under his breath and, finally, the magic faded. It couldn’t have been more than ten seconds, but they were both exhausted. Lopt’s hands were shaking as he bagged the piece and tagged it with their best guess as to its function.
‘And we’re done for the day,’ he said. ‘Quick work,’ he added.
Loki nodded, less startled by the praise this time since he was sure he’d earned it.
The first time Loki felt like he personally had screwed up was a few weeks in. Up until then he’d been able to deal with activated pieces, and the few he’d had to destroy had been fairly clearly security only from the analysis.
This time Lopt had removed a long, thin piece. It was a strange collection of angles, and they’d removed several smaller pieces from its coils before getting to it. Loki nearly missed the telltale burst of magic it was so subtle and, when he threw his will at it, it somehow slipped aside. Grasping at it was like grasping a living thing, it slid through his hands like an eel. And, to his horror, it was doing a similar thing in its physical manifestation. It stretched out, losing its angles and curving sinuously, slipping out of the pliers even as Lopt gripped them with both hands.
It dived at one of those hands, going through the leather glove with no more difficulty than if it had been silk. Lopt dropped the pliers and grabbed his wrist with the other hand; afraid it was trying to burrow its way further into his body, Loki realised. He wasn’t sure what magic he could use on it without hurting Lopt, or what further behaviour magic might trigger.
A sudden thought had him reaching for his throwing knife and his aim was as perfect as he’d trained himself to be. The knife pierced cleanly through Lopt’s hand and the magic didn’t so much fade as die screaming.
Lopt bent over, cradling his injured hand and shivering with reaction. He looked…turquoise, Loki thought, which was probably not a good colour for a frost giant.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Loki.
Lopt let out a shaky laugh. ‘Don’t apologise. You know as well as I do that you just saved my life.’ He reached for the knife tentatively, already wincing, and pulled it out. ‘You’re going to have to get the bits of falconskin out for me,’ he said.
Loki nodded. ‘Sit down,’ he said. There was a first aid kit in the workshop, he remembered, and tweezers would be better than pliers. Besides, they were going to need the bandages.
Lopt let him pull the pieces out without fuss but his colour was still bad and he was trembling. ‘Are you all right?’ Loki asked, somewhat worried about magical aftereffects.
To his surprise Lopt looked a bit embarrassed. ‘I’m not good with pain. It’s part of why I’m so useless in battle. I’ll be fine once I’ve had some rest and started healing.’
‘Will you be able to walk home?’ asked Loki. It was disconcerting but almost reassuring to find a way in which Lopt didn’t have him at a disadvantage.
‘Yes, just give me a moment,’ said Lopt.
Loki put their things away while Lopt collected himself, and they managed to make it home without trouble.
The town was falling. Ice was cracking, sharp as a hammer blow, and it seemed impossible that it should happen so quickly. Those who could world-walk were leaving, grabbing any children in reach and pulling them away into extradimensional space. They’d be back as soon as they could, but not soon enough. Sigyn pulled heat out of the ice desperately, already too late to do any good but hoping to hold down the fractures. It felt like cupping a shattering tea cup in her hands, she was trying to hold it together even if it only kept the pieces in place for another moment. If she could just keep it together long enough for the Jotuns here to get to firmer ice (the cracks were spreading invisibly under the tundra until the soil suddenly fell away, leaving a spider web of darkened lines).
The icedrake dived into the ruins of the town with the grace and confidence of a cat. Sigyn swore. She hadn’t seen it coming, too focused on the buildings shaking themselves to pieces while the people hadn’t yet had time to get away.
Icedrakes were ferocious predators. They stalked the outer tundra, feeding on the great shaggy elk, and the edges of the sea, where they hunted seals and penguins. They were large predators, not built for taking small prey, and the inner tundra only had one species large enough to hold their interest. Those who had territories there made Jotun the primary part of their diet. There were a few tame ones, owned by those with the means to feed them and the magic to control them, but the wild ones were fearless maneaters.
The Jotun child this one had singled out shrank back against the ruined wall of what had been a house. Sigyn threw up her hand and the icedrake stopped, finding itself surrounded by a circle of flame. The child was clearly too shocked to move, even as the flames further melted the wall behind them. The icedrake snarled. A hand grabbed the child’s and a moment later the street was empty, save for the icedrake making a series of small charges at the circle of fire. Each time it came up short, shaking its massive head in frustration.
‘Can you kill it?’ One of the mages who had been helping Sigyn hadn’t been a world-walker, and he was the one who asked the question now.
She shook her head. ‘How?’
‘Roast it.’
‘If it finds itself in a fire it would just run out of it. But it won’t run into one.’ Sigyn’s words sounded measured, distant even to her. It was hard to keep a flame going with no fuel, and the fire was more than half illusion even though the heat was real.
A moment later the world-walkers returned for the next wave of refugees.
Later that day, back in the palace and recovered from pushing herself, she told Byleist about the icedrake.
‘They’ve been attacking even towns that aren’t falling,’ said Byleist. ‘They’re hungry. I’ll send some mages to deal with them.’ He didn’t say that every mage was already needed in three different places, or that he was weighing up which lives had to be lost in making that call. But he looked tired.
‘Send Vali,’ said Sigyn ‘Wolf might be his preferred form but it’s not his only one. I’ve seen him as a firedrake before.’ Byleist might still have to send mages, Vali couldn’t be everywhere, but he wouldn’t have to send as many.
‘You’d send your son up against icedrakes?’ asked Byleist.
‘Not if I didn’t think he could handle it,’ said Sigyn. ‘He’s an experienced warrior. I trust him not to fight when it’s hopeless, or give up before it is. You could send me as well.’
Byleist thought for a moment and shook his head. ‘No. Carry on as you were. You’ll probably have to fight them anyway.’
Sigyn still hadn’t had that talk with Vali. They needed to protect people any way they could, but if he died doing this - well, that would be the least of her regrets.
Jotuns could do fire magic, but it wasn’t easy.
It was only days later, but the icedrakes were already growing bolder. Three at once had attacked the village they were trying to evacuate today -- and while obviously, the most vulnerable places were being prioritised for help, Sigyn still cringed to think of what might be happening elsewhere.
She couldn’t think of elsewhere right now, when there were icedrakes here. At least she had help from the mages she’d been teaching to redistribute heat, even if some of them were looking understandably panicky.
‘Just focus the heat instead of casting it away,’ said Sigyn quickly. ‘It’s not that different from what we’ve been doing. Just hold it.’
She was supplying the illusory flames on all three circles. The mages next to her were having a hard enough time helping with the heat. One of the icedrakes abruptly stopped pacing, skin glistening with water. Trying to go dormant, Sigyn realised. Icedrakes did that, froze themselves at night as both an extra layer of protection and a way to catch parasites in the ice and shed them. Right now this one wanted to avoid the heat.
Sigyn grabbed the wrist of the Jotun who was holding that circle. ‘Switch with me.’
Heat, she thought. The icedrake’s slick skin reflected the flames, red and orange droplets sliding from it. She poured on the heat, stopping it from freezing, hoping the Jotuns could hold the other two. Hoping, too, that the icedrake was driven by instinct more than intelligence. The puddle around the icedrake’s feet reflected the turmoil of the flames as it slowly slumped to its knees, dehydration starting to kick in. Sigyn could feel sweat standing out on her own skin, under the heavy furs that normally only made the cold bearable. Just as it fell a cry went up and for a moment Sigyn almost mistook it for a cheer. Instead it was a cry of dismay, one of the other circles had broken.
The last circle flickered, the mages distracted by the free and furious icedrake. Sigyn threw her power into it, taking over, wondering only after she had whether she should have trusted them to pick it up again and tried to confine the escapee. There were screams, refugees still everywhere in the rapidly falling city. The strongest adults were converging, moving towards the icedrakes with weapons, often hastily formed of ice, and grim expressions. One stabbed the fallen icedrake in the throat with an ice spear, blood freezing and clinging to it in a layer of vivid red.
The icedrake looked at the circle of spears, and it could probably have charged through them without more damage than a man running through briars. It crouched, powerful hind legs gathered under it. It jumped, huge and lithe, passing over them like a shadow and landing among the children and elderly who were trying to get away.
‘Hold the last circle,‘ Sigyn snapped. ‘No matter what happens.‘
She tried to throw a circle of fire around the icedrake, even as she ran towards it, but it sputtered and died. The sweat on her face was freezing there, and she swiped it away with one arm. Exhaustion setting in, too much to conjure fire in a land of ice. She threw her will at it instead, the way she did with creatures in extra-dimensional space. But there will was action. Here ropes made of will were gossamer and she had to throw herself into it more and more to hold the icedrake. It snorted and shuddered, twisting against bonds it couldn’t see, confused but breaking the threads with every motion. Being closer to it helped, pouring her will into it helped.
Sigyn went from running flat out to face down in the snow without being sure how she’d gone from one to the other. Raising her head seemed to take effort she needed to use elsewhere, she twisted it to one side and let it drop again. The icedrake was twisting, snarling, churning the snow at its feet into a welter of slush. She was barely twelve feet from it.
It’s going to eat me as soon as the magic fails, she thought, her own voice oddly calm in her head. Perhaps she was too tired for panic. Loki will be distraught. But I took responsibility for these people. I had to do something.
She felt the motion of something charging, saw the huge shadow flickering at the edge of her vision. The other icedrake had got loose after all. Please let the refugees have got out in time.
The dragon that charged into her line of sight was rippled gold, brighter than the sun in this world of pale colours. Long and sinuous, wiry muscles sliding under its scaled skin. Firedrake. Vali.
The flame that shot from its mouth and nose engulfed the icedrake and the creature yelped, a strange noise for something so large and menacing. Sigyn felt it break the last strands of her magic in its panic. Vali jumped it before it had time to react, claws digging into its shoulders as his serpentine neck swept over it to bite one of its back legs to the bone. He let go and it fled, limping. It would bleed out from a bite like that and Vali tossed his head in satisfaction before sweeping around himself and snatching Sigyn up in one claw.
Vali’s motion on three legs was both flowing and bumpy, with a sudden lurch every time his right forefoot should have come down. His scaly side was smooth and warm, impossibly warm it seemed, and Sigyn had to blink hard to keep herself from falling asleep despite everything. Vali dropped her gently but unceremoniously back among the Jotun mages. His head snaked around to look at her and Sigyn put one hand on his pointed nose, almost a beak, looking up into his worried blue eyes.
‘Thank you,‘ she said.
Vali huffed warm air over her and turned away. A moment later he was charging to where the flames of the last circle were already starting to flicker out.
He ran straight through the flames, his gold scales turning red in their light and making him look like he was formed from flames himself. The icedrake, still held by the remains of the circle, ducked under him and came up, snapping powerful jaws at the base of his neck. Vali evaded it, sliding away and back into the fire again to come on it from another angle. The flames were lower still now, this would be the last time he could use that tactic. Sigyn wished she wasn’t too tired to raise the flames again.
Vali came out behind the icedrake, snapping at its leg and leaving a trail of red droplets, red as the last dying flames. The scene was hazy with smoke - no, not smoke, not from that sourceless fire - hazy with tiredness and the mist of Sigyn’s own breath. The two dragons wove together like knotwork, like a tapestry, bright as silk. The icedrake used its greater bulk to push Vali away, coming at him side on and getting its shoulder against him, only for him to coil around himself, seeming to snap over his own back like a whip flicking in midair, and get it under the throat. The position gave the icedrake an opening and it aimed a bite at the back of his neck, teeth tearing even as he slid out from under its crushing jaws before it could get a grip.
Blood ran down the back of Vali’s neck like some strange crest, a brilliant counterpoint to rippled gold. The red stood out more starkly on the icy blue of his opponent, one gash below its neck and one on its leg. The two separated, eyeing one another. The icedrake couldn’t run, although it wanted to, with its leg injured showing its vulnerable rear to its opponent would mean death before it could get away. Its eyes showed the awareness of its plight, vicious with fear now more than predatory intent. More dangerous than ever.
They circled, at first seeming just to be looking for an opening in one another’s defences. But Vali was herding it, gradually, carefully, towards the cracked and rotten ice. The icedrake backed up, hardly aware it was doing so, until the ice creaked under it. It stopped then, stock still apart from its head which was swinging from side to side, held low, looking for a way out. Vali stretched, tail held high, making himself look bigger than he was. He was breathtaking, an amber carving set in a platinum landscape, somehow dwarfing the bulkier icedrake. For one endless moment the tableau held.
Vali’s flame hit the rotten ice under the icedrake’s feet and a cloud of steam engulfed it. Sigyn saw it tense, pushing with its back legs like a cat in order to jump, and the ice gave way completely. The icedrake struggled to the surface, head rearing out of the water desperately. The icemages behind Sigyn murmured a word together, so much in unison even that seemed loud.
The ice around the icedrake froze solid, holding it with its neck and head, and one claw, above the surface. Like a heraldic shield half submerged. Vali bent forward and bit its throat out, turning away with blood on his golden mouth.
‘They’re asking too much of you,’ said Vali.
‘They sent you out to hunt icedrakes, too,’ answered Sigyn.
‘Yes, but not to hunt icedrakes, and heat-dump, and world-walk refugees to safety, and teach people. If they wanted you to do the job of four people they should have allowed a larger relief team.’
Sigyn rubbed her head. ‘I feel sorry for Byleist. He’s trying not to worry his people by inviting too many of us in, but he desperately needs the help.’
‘He’s going to have to make up his mind whether he’d rather have them worried or dead,’ said Vali. He stood up and paced down the room. ‘And you should tell him you can’t stop him from having to make that decision by being everywhere.’
‘…They’re going to need me back on Asgard soon, anyway,’ said Sigyn, her shoulders slumping. ‘The Bifrost wreckage should be ready to be moved soon, and they always wanted me there for that. I’ve been trying to do as much as I could before leaving.’
Vali turned on her, almost snarling. ‘Don’t you dare feel guilty! None of this has been your fault, you don’t need to nearly kill yourself for them as some kind of apology.’
Sigyn looked at him sadly and shook her head. ‘It’s not guilt, Vali. I want everyone to come out of this alive and well. I want to protect them, even when I know it’s foolish.’
‘That’s the kind of thinking that gets father into trouble!’ snapped Vali. ‘Thinking he’s the only one that can make a difference, or knows how to make a difference. You as well. Neither of you have any faith in the rest of us.’
That is not true.' The words came out more heated than she'd meant them to, and Sigyn's head came up as the anger gave her energy. 'I know very well what you can do. I told Byleist you could handle icedrakes.'
‘Of course I can handle icedrakes, you've seen me fight dragons before,’ said Vali, running a hand through his hair in irritation and wincing as it hit the cut on the back of his neck. ‘That's not the point. You get to decide whether I can handle icedrakes, but who gets to decide what you can handle?’
‘I didn't decide anything for you.’ Just what he'd be asked to do. But that was what they'd come here for, and not what he was complaining about. Sigyn folded her arms. ‘And I don't pretend to be the only one who can do anything, but I will try to do as much as I can when I'm the one on the spot.’
'You're only on the spot because Byleist is trying to avoid making difficult decisions and you'd rather take them on yourself than leave him to do his duty!'
'I'm here. I can see what needs doing. I can't just turn away!' Except that she was going to have to leave. She closed her eyes and sighed. 'He seems so very young.' It was not quite a non sequitur. Sigyn didn't think she lacked faith in anyone who had come here from Asgard, but even though Byleist was doing relatively well thus far, she didn't know what to expect from him.
Odin had not been so very much older, at the end of the war with the Vanir. When he had gritted his teeth and asked for mercy from the people who had just killed his father. But she hadn't been old enough then for him to seem like a child.
'He'll have to grow up quickly then,' said Vali. 'Once food shortages really set in the people who still have supplies will try to secede before anyone can make them share.'
'Yes.' Sigyn rubbed at the back of her own neck and realised it was tenser than she'd thought. Then, 'They really need Vanir help, don't they.'
Vali came back over and sat down, the angry energy that had been sustaining him draining away abruptly. 'At least you're talking about getting them help and not handing them powerful artefacts,' he said.
Sigyn looked over at him with a slight frown, but she was too tired to get angry with him again and really didn't want to. And they did still need to talk about that. "I think the only one that would help is the casket, and whatever else he might be doing, I don't think Loki's namesake is going to hand that over. Hod was a different situation." Although, as it had turned out, still a bad idea.
'You should have told us,' said Vali, scowling at her. 'Even if you didn't trust Odin, you should have told me and Nari and Leikin. Not just decided only you and Father knew what to do.'
'We barely saw any of you during that time,' Sigyn pointed out. 'And when we knew where you were, it generally involved a battle. Or the preparation or aftermath. Or you were with Odin. Or several of the above.' In Leikin's case, she'd sometimes been with Baldr. Sigyn leaned back and pressed her fingertips up into her eyebrows.
'Did you really think we would help Odin with plans to conquer Midgard?'
'Did you really think we would want Asgard destroyed?' Sigyn shot back. Vali's mouth tightened, and her shoulders slumped. 'We were not fair to you,' she said quietly.
Vali looked startled, as if he hadn't expected the concession. 'I didn't know what you'd intended,' he said. 'It never occurred to me that you would hide something done with good intentions from the rest of us. It was easier to believe you'd betrayed us than that you'd trusted us that little, however much I wished not to believe either.'
'Things looked very different from where we were," Sigyn said, rather wearily. Weary in general, not of this conversation, however heartsick it made her to hear that. And to think back over the long years of suspicion. 'It seemed entirely plausible, then, that after so much troubl
e Odin had decided to keep Midgard, through Baldr anyway. And that Asgard would go along with the idea. It's not as if we'd exactly balked over Vanaheim.'
'That was before my time,' said Vali. 'I didn't think of how things might look to someone who fought in that.' He scrubbed a hand over his face. 'I liked Hod too. That's part of why I wished you hadn't given him Mistletienn. Maybe Baldr would have killed him sooner without it, but he deserved a better death than he got.'
'He did. And I'm sorry it had to be you. For your sake and... because it added to our misconceptions.' She sighed again. 'I wish we hadn't now, too. We never expected him to get as carried away as he did, and in retrospect we probably should have.' Sigyn fell pensively silent for a moment. 'He and Baldr may have been the only people involved who each thought the other was behaving completely reasonably.'
Vali nodded, sombrely. 'Impossible to blame either of them for using power they were given. They were warriors of their people.'
'Yes.' Sigyn reached over for her son's hand. 'I think,' she said ruefully, 'there is perhaps only so far we can blame Byleist, either. He must have learned of the other worlds mostly from Laufey, after all.'
Authors: Khilari and Persephone_Kore
Summary: Thor and Loki were not the first of Odin's loved ones to bear those names. After the events of the movie, Loki is planning his next moves when he discovers a frost giant imprisoned in a volcano, who proves to be both the uncle he was named for and Laufey's first child. Soon Loki has a new mentor, Asgard is shaking off isolationist tendencies, Jotunheim is receiving foreign aid, and Earth is suddenly and vividly reacquainted with the existence of aliens....
Authors' Note: We were partially inspired by some of the theories proposed on the TV Tropes WMG page for the movie. We have taken the movie and combined it with the Eddas, the Gesta Danorum, and bits and pieces from other Marvel sources. We're having a lot of fun with it and hope you enjoy the result.
Chapter Eight
It was with some regret that Loki decided he now knew how to use the falconskin and it was time to move to stage two - dismantling it. He’d been expecting that part of things to be difficult, and was stubbornly ignoring the thought that if Odin had failed he had no chance. What he hadn’t expected it to involve was so much preparation.
‘We need to rent a workshop? Really?’ he asked. They had already rented a new apartment and he’d expected to be able to work from there.
Lopt shrugged. ‘It will be easier somewhere proof against extreme temperatures. We’ll have to use the casket extensively and it’s possible the defenses will use fire.’ When Loki looked disbelieving Lopt grinned, one of those expressions which still looked completely wrong on a frost giant face. ‘It’s a major export item and usually sold to magic adepts. The defenses aren’t as much of an overkill as they seem.’
Loki conceded the point and went looking for jewellery workshops to rent. He also acceded to Lopt’s insistence on leather aprons, leather gloves and safety goggles although not without complaining.
‘Are the goggles really necessary?’ he asked. ‘I’m sure you and Odin didn’t use them.’
‘Because they hadn’t been invented at the time. I’m all for taking advantage of mortal ingenuity, especially if it stops things trying to blind me,’ said Lopt. ‘This is going to be difficult enough without leaving ourselves vulnerable on purpose.’
Which was perfectly true and enough to carry the argument. The argument about glamours didn’t even need to be spoken. Loki was less than thrilled about the idea of spending long periods of time without one but knew the casket was their best chance of success, so as soon as they had the door to the workshop locked they both dropped the glamours they had been wearing on the way. Loki pulled on the gloves with a feeling of relief that it would stop him having to see his own hands.
Lopt put the falconskin, just the pendant since the chain was apparently unimportant, on the workbench and put their toolbox on the next bench over. As well as renting a jewellery workshop they had also bought some jewellers’ hand tools; the workshop didn’t come with them included and, in any case, Lopt had thrown a rather startling amount of magic into some of them.
‘Right,’ said Lopt. ‘The first layer of magic is self-destructive. If we get it wrong the whole thing will fuse. Fortunately, I remember how to do that after getting that far with, oh, about fifty falconskins over the years.’
Lopt pulled out a small, but thoroughly bespelled, metal punch and a hammer and put them next to the falconskin on the bench. He ran one finger from the top of the pendant to the bottom, murmuring spells as he did. Loki listened hard, trying to memorise them. Then Lopt picked up the punch, placed it carefully on the surface of the pendant, and tapped it lightly with the hammer. Cracks spread over the surface of the falconskin, but very geometric cracks. The final effect was something like a puzzle box; you could see how many tiny, intricate shapes went to make up the whole.
Lopt put the punch aside with a quick breath of relief. ‘And now for the tricky bit,’ he said, sounding positively gleeful about the prospect. ‘There are three types of pieces here, pieces that work the falconskin, pieces that serve as security and pieces that do both.’
Loki nodded.
‘The best thing to do is deactivate pieces with security measures before removing them. Which means analysing everything very carefully before doing anything at all, since the touch of magic will activate them. Mostly it’s going to be a long, slow process. And sometimes we’re going to miss something and activate a piece. Some of them might activate when you remove their neighbours, sometimes we’ll have gotten the deactivation spell wrong. Some might pretend to be just function pieces and then turn out to have hidden security measures.’ Lopt paused and looked across at Loki. ‘At that point you have until it goes active to analyse it and break the spellwork. Or rather I do, your job is to slow the spell down.’
‘How?’ said Loki. He was starting to feel more excited about this than he had about flying, similar to the feeling of first exploring the ways by himself. Doing something that should probably be impossible, was certainly going to be dangerous, and knowing he was going to do his absolute best to pull it off. Did Thor felt like this before a battle, he wondered, before frowning and pushing the stray thought aside to focus on Lopt.
‘It’s going to be a judgement call,’ admitted Lopt. ‘In most cases just throw your will at it and back that up with the casket. In some cases it can be set up to resist or reflect strong magic and you’ll have to go for a lighter touch. If it doesn’t seem to be working, adjust your tactics. If you can’t hold it and it looks seriously dangerous then destroy it - you probably won’t have time to ask me in that situation. Try not to do that too much, though. We can afford to lose security only pieces, but not function ones.’
‘I understand,’ said Loki. ‘Should I summon the casket now?’
Lopt shook his head. ‘Summon it when we’re ready to remove something. For now let’s pick a piece and get started on analysing it.’
It was just as long and slow a process as Lopt had promised. Hours of analysis that were part magical theory test, part logic puzzle, followed by Lopt carefully implementing the deactivation spell they’d designed and then pulling the piece out with needle-nosed pliers, while Loki stood by with the casket between his hands and both of them tried to remember to breathe.
It was a few days before they slipped up. Instead of the normal slight fading feeling the deactivation triggered a burst of magic. Loki responded almost before he’d had time to finish the thought, pushing it back down. It felt like trying to hold an explosion back with his hands but, startlingly, he was winning. Lopt murmured a frantic string of words under his breath and, finally, the magic faded. It couldn’t have been more than ten seconds, but they were both exhausted. Lopt’s hands were shaking as he bagged the piece and tagged it with their best guess as to its function.
‘And we’re done for the day,’ he said. ‘Quick work,’ he added.
Loki nodded, less startled by the praise this time since he was sure he’d earned it.
The first time Loki felt like he personally had screwed up was a few weeks in. Up until then he’d been able to deal with activated pieces, and the few he’d had to destroy had been fairly clearly security only from the analysis.
This time Lopt had removed a long, thin piece. It was a strange collection of angles, and they’d removed several smaller pieces from its coils before getting to it. Loki nearly missed the telltale burst of magic it was so subtle and, when he threw his will at it, it somehow slipped aside. Grasping at it was like grasping a living thing, it slid through his hands like an eel. And, to his horror, it was doing a similar thing in its physical manifestation. It stretched out, losing its angles and curving sinuously, slipping out of the pliers even as Lopt gripped them with both hands.
It dived at one of those hands, going through the leather glove with no more difficulty than if it had been silk. Lopt dropped the pliers and grabbed his wrist with the other hand; afraid it was trying to burrow its way further into his body, Loki realised. He wasn’t sure what magic he could use on it without hurting Lopt, or what further behaviour magic might trigger.
A sudden thought had him reaching for his throwing knife and his aim was as perfect as he’d trained himself to be. The knife pierced cleanly through Lopt’s hand and the magic didn’t so much fade as die screaming.
Lopt bent over, cradling his injured hand and shivering with reaction. He looked…turquoise, Loki thought, which was probably not a good colour for a frost giant.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Loki.
Lopt let out a shaky laugh. ‘Don’t apologise. You know as well as I do that you just saved my life.’ He reached for the knife tentatively, already wincing, and pulled it out. ‘You’re going to have to get the bits of falconskin out for me,’ he said.
Loki nodded. ‘Sit down,’ he said. There was a first aid kit in the workshop, he remembered, and tweezers would be better than pliers. Besides, they were going to need the bandages.
Lopt let him pull the pieces out without fuss but his colour was still bad and he was trembling. ‘Are you all right?’ Loki asked, somewhat worried about magical aftereffects.
To his surprise Lopt looked a bit embarrassed. ‘I’m not good with pain. It’s part of why I’m so useless in battle. I’ll be fine once I’ve had some rest and started healing.’
‘Will you be able to walk home?’ asked Loki. It was disconcerting but almost reassuring to find a way in which Lopt didn’t have him at a disadvantage.
‘Yes, just give me a moment,’ said Lopt.
Loki put their things away while Lopt collected himself, and they managed to make it home without trouble.
The town was falling. Ice was cracking, sharp as a hammer blow, and it seemed impossible that it should happen so quickly. Those who could world-walk were leaving, grabbing any children in reach and pulling them away into extradimensional space. They’d be back as soon as they could, but not soon enough. Sigyn pulled heat out of the ice desperately, already too late to do any good but hoping to hold down the fractures. It felt like cupping a shattering tea cup in her hands, she was trying to hold it together even if it only kept the pieces in place for another moment. If she could just keep it together long enough for the Jotuns here to get to firmer ice (the cracks were spreading invisibly under the tundra until the soil suddenly fell away, leaving a spider web of darkened lines).
The icedrake dived into the ruins of the town with the grace and confidence of a cat. Sigyn swore. She hadn’t seen it coming, too focused on the buildings shaking themselves to pieces while the people hadn’t yet had time to get away.
Icedrakes were ferocious predators. They stalked the outer tundra, feeding on the great shaggy elk, and the edges of the sea, where they hunted seals and penguins. They were large predators, not built for taking small prey, and the inner tundra only had one species large enough to hold their interest. Those who had territories there made Jotun the primary part of their diet. There were a few tame ones, owned by those with the means to feed them and the magic to control them, but the wild ones were fearless maneaters.
The Jotun child this one had singled out shrank back against the ruined wall of what had been a house. Sigyn threw up her hand and the icedrake stopped, finding itself surrounded by a circle of flame. The child was clearly too shocked to move, even as the flames further melted the wall behind them. The icedrake snarled. A hand grabbed the child’s and a moment later the street was empty, save for the icedrake making a series of small charges at the circle of fire. Each time it came up short, shaking its massive head in frustration.
‘Can you kill it?’ One of the mages who had been helping Sigyn hadn’t been a world-walker, and he was the one who asked the question now.
She shook her head. ‘How?’
‘Roast it.’
‘If it finds itself in a fire it would just run out of it. But it won’t run into one.’ Sigyn’s words sounded measured, distant even to her. It was hard to keep a flame going with no fuel, and the fire was more than half illusion even though the heat was real.
A moment later the world-walkers returned for the next wave of refugees.
Later that day, back in the palace and recovered from pushing herself, she told Byleist about the icedrake.
‘They’ve been attacking even towns that aren’t falling,’ said Byleist. ‘They’re hungry. I’ll send some mages to deal with them.’ He didn’t say that every mage was already needed in three different places, or that he was weighing up which lives had to be lost in making that call. But he looked tired.
‘Send Vali,’ said Sigyn ‘Wolf might be his preferred form but it’s not his only one. I’ve seen him as a firedrake before.’ Byleist might still have to send mages, Vali couldn’t be everywhere, but he wouldn’t have to send as many.
‘You’d send your son up against icedrakes?’ asked Byleist.
‘Not if I didn’t think he could handle it,’ said Sigyn. ‘He’s an experienced warrior. I trust him not to fight when it’s hopeless, or give up before it is. You could send me as well.’
Byleist thought for a moment and shook his head. ‘No. Carry on as you were. You’ll probably have to fight them anyway.’
Sigyn still hadn’t had that talk with Vali. They needed to protect people any way they could, but if he died doing this - well, that would be the least of her regrets.
Jotuns could do fire magic, but it wasn’t easy.
It was only days later, but the icedrakes were already growing bolder. Three at once had attacked the village they were trying to evacuate today -- and while obviously, the most vulnerable places were being prioritised for help, Sigyn still cringed to think of what might be happening elsewhere.
She couldn’t think of elsewhere right now, when there were icedrakes here. At least she had help from the mages she’d been teaching to redistribute heat, even if some of them were looking understandably panicky.
‘Just focus the heat instead of casting it away,’ said Sigyn quickly. ‘It’s not that different from what we’ve been doing. Just hold it.’
She was supplying the illusory flames on all three circles. The mages next to her were having a hard enough time helping with the heat. One of the icedrakes abruptly stopped pacing, skin glistening with water. Trying to go dormant, Sigyn realised. Icedrakes did that, froze themselves at night as both an extra layer of protection and a way to catch parasites in the ice and shed them. Right now this one wanted to avoid the heat.
Sigyn grabbed the wrist of the Jotun who was holding that circle. ‘Switch with me.’
Heat, she thought. The icedrake’s slick skin reflected the flames, red and orange droplets sliding from it. She poured on the heat, stopping it from freezing, hoping the Jotuns could hold the other two. Hoping, too, that the icedrake was driven by instinct more than intelligence. The puddle around the icedrake’s feet reflected the turmoil of the flames as it slowly slumped to its knees, dehydration starting to kick in. Sigyn could feel sweat standing out on her own skin, under the heavy furs that normally only made the cold bearable. Just as it fell a cry went up and for a moment Sigyn almost mistook it for a cheer. Instead it was a cry of dismay, one of the other circles had broken.
The last circle flickered, the mages distracted by the free and furious icedrake. Sigyn threw her power into it, taking over, wondering only after she had whether she should have trusted them to pick it up again and tried to confine the escapee. There were screams, refugees still everywhere in the rapidly falling city. The strongest adults were converging, moving towards the icedrakes with weapons, often hastily formed of ice, and grim expressions. One stabbed the fallen icedrake in the throat with an ice spear, blood freezing and clinging to it in a layer of vivid red.
The icedrake looked at the circle of spears, and it could probably have charged through them without more damage than a man running through briars. It crouched, powerful hind legs gathered under it. It jumped, huge and lithe, passing over them like a shadow and landing among the children and elderly who were trying to get away.
‘Hold the last circle,‘ Sigyn snapped. ‘No matter what happens.‘
She tried to throw a circle of fire around the icedrake, even as she ran towards it, but it sputtered and died. The sweat on her face was freezing there, and she swiped it away with one arm. Exhaustion setting in, too much to conjure fire in a land of ice. She threw her will at it instead, the way she did with creatures in extra-dimensional space. But there will was action. Here ropes made of will were gossamer and she had to throw herself into it more and more to hold the icedrake. It snorted and shuddered, twisting against bonds it couldn’t see, confused but breaking the threads with every motion. Being closer to it helped, pouring her will into it helped.
Sigyn went from running flat out to face down in the snow without being sure how she’d gone from one to the other. Raising her head seemed to take effort she needed to use elsewhere, she twisted it to one side and let it drop again. The icedrake was twisting, snarling, churning the snow at its feet into a welter of slush. She was barely twelve feet from it.
It’s going to eat me as soon as the magic fails, she thought, her own voice oddly calm in her head. Perhaps she was too tired for panic. Loki will be distraught. But I took responsibility for these people. I had to do something.
She felt the motion of something charging, saw the huge shadow flickering at the edge of her vision. The other icedrake had got loose after all. Please let the refugees have got out in time.
The dragon that charged into her line of sight was rippled gold, brighter than the sun in this world of pale colours. Long and sinuous, wiry muscles sliding under its scaled skin. Firedrake. Vali.
The flame that shot from its mouth and nose engulfed the icedrake and the creature yelped, a strange noise for something so large and menacing. Sigyn felt it break the last strands of her magic in its panic. Vali jumped it before it had time to react, claws digging into its shoulders as his serpentine neck swept over it to bite one of its back legs to the bone. He let go and it fled, limping. It would bleed out from a bite like that and Vali tossed his head in satisfaction before sweeping around himself and snatching Sigyn up in one claw.
Vali’s motion on three legs was both flowing and bumpy, with a sudden lurch every time his right forefoot should have come down. His scaly side was smooth and warm, impossibly warm it seemed, and Sigyn had to blink hard to keep herself from falling asleep despite everything. Vali dropped her gently but unceremoniously back among the Jotun mages. His head snaked around to look at her and Sigyn put one hand on his pointed nose, almost a beak, looking up into his worried blue eyes.
‘Thank you,‘ she said.
Vali huffed warm air over her and turned away. A moment later he was charging to where the flames of the last circle were already starting to flicker out.
He ran straight through the flames, his gold scales turning red in their light and making him look like he was formed from flames himself. The icedrake, still held by the remains of the circle, ducked under him and came up, snapping powerful jaws at the base of his neck. Vali evaded it, sliding away and back into the fire again to come on it from another angle. The flames were lower still now, this would be the last time he could use that tactic. Sigyn wished she wasn’t too tired to raise the flames again.
Vali came out behind the icedrake, snapping at its leg and leaving a trail of red droplets, red as the last dying flames. The scene was hazy with smoke - no, not smoke, not from that sourceless fire - hazy with tiredness and the mist of Sigyn’s own breath. The two dragons wove together like knotwork, like a tapestry, bright as silk. The icedrake used its greater bulk to push Vali away, coming at him side on and getting its shoulder against him, only for him to coil around himself, seeming to snap over his own back like a whip flicking in midair, and get it under the throat. The position gave the icedrake an opening and it aimed a bite at the back of his neck, teeth tearing even as he slid out from under its crushing jaws before it could get a grip.
Blood ran down the back of Vali’s neck like some strange crest, a brilliant counterpoint to rippled gold. The red stood out more starkly on the icy blue of his opponent, one gash below its neck and one on its leg. The two separated, eyeing one another. The icedrake couldn’t run, although it wanted to, with its leg injured showing its vulnerable rear to its opponent would mean death before it could get away. Its eyes showed the awareness of its plight, vicious with fear now more than predatory intent. More dangerous than ever.
They circled, at first seeming just to be looking for an opening in one another’s defences. But Vali was herding it, gradually, carefully, towards the cracked and rotten ice. The icedrake backed up, hardly aware it was doing so, until the ice creaked under it. It stopped then, stock still apart from its head which was swinging from side to side, held low, looking for a way out. Vali stretched, tail held high, making himself look bigger than he was. He was breathtaking, an amber carving set in a platinum landscape, somehow dwarfing the bulkier icedrake. For one endless moment the tableau held.
Vali’s flame hit the rotten ice under the icedrake’s feet and a cloud of steam engulfed it. Sigyn saw it tense, pushing with its back legs like a cat in order to jump, and the ice gave way completely. The icedrake struggled to the surface, head rearing out of the water desperately. The icemages behind Sigyn murmured a word together, so much in unison even that seemed loud.
The ice around the icedrake froze solid, holding it with its neck and head, and one claw, above the surface. Like a heraldic shield half submerged. Vali bent forward and bit its throat out, turning away with blood on his golden mouth.
‘They’re asking too much of you,’ said Vali.
‘They sent you out to hunt icedrakes, too,’ answered Sigyn.
‘Yes, but not to hunt icedrakes, and heat-dump, and world-walk refugees to safety, and teach people. If they wanted you to do the job of four people they should have allowed a larger relief team.’
Sigyn rubbed her head. ‘I feel sorry for Byleist. He’s trying not to worry his people by inviting too many of us in, but he desperately needs the help.’
‘He’s going to have to make up his mind whether he’d rather have them worried or dead,’ said Vali. He stood up and paced down the room. ‘And you should tell him you can’t stop him from having to make that decision by being everywhere.’
‘…They’re going to need me back on Asgard soon, anyway,’ said Sigyn, her shoulders slumping. ‘The Bifrost wreckage should be ready to be moved soon, and they always wanted me there for that. I’ve been trying to do as much as I could before leaving.’
Vali turned on her, almost snarling. ‘Don’t you dare feel guilty! None of this has been your fault, you don’t need to nearly kill yourself for them as some kind of apology.’
Sigyn looked at him sadly and shook her head. ‘It’s not guilt, Vali. I want everyone to come out of this alive and well. I want to protect them, even when I know it’s foolish.’
‘That’s the kind of thinking that gets father into trouble!’ snapped Vali. ‘Thinking he’s the only one that can make a difference, or knows how to make a difference. You as well. Neither of you have any faith in the rest of us.’
That is not true.' The words came out more heated than she'd meant them to, and Sigyn's head came up as the anger gave her energy. 'I know very well what you can do. I told Byleist you could handle icedrakes.'
‘Of course I can handle icedrakes, you've seen me fight dragons before,’ said Vali, running a hand through his hair in irritation and wincing as it hit the cut on the back of his neck. ‘That's not the point. You get to decide whether I can handle icedrakes, but who gets to decide what you can handle?’
‘I didn't decide anything for you.’ Just what he'd be asked to do. But that was what they'd come here for, and not what he was complaining about. Sigyn folded her arms. ‘And I don't pretend to be the only one who can do anything, but I will try to do as much as I can when I'm the one on the spot.’
'You're only on the spot because Byleist is trying to avoid making difficult decisions and you'd rather take them on yourself than leave him to do his duty!'
'I'm here. I can see what needs doing. I can't just turn away!' Except that she was going to have to leave. She closed her eyes and sighed. 'He seems so very young.' It was not quite a non sequitur. Sigyn didn't think she lacked faith in anyone who had come here from Asgard, but even though Byleist was doing relatively well thus far, she didn't know what to expect from him.
Odin had not been so very much older, at the end of the war with the Vanir. When he had gritted his teeth and asked for mercy from the people who had just killed his father. But she hadn't been old enough then for him to seem like a child.
'He'll have to grow up quickly then,' said Vali. 'Once food shortages really set in the people who still have supplies will try to secede before anyone can make them share.'
'Yes.' Sigyn rubbed at the back of her own neck and realised it was tenser than she'd thought. Then, 'They really need Vanir help, don't they.'
Vali came back over and sat down, the angry energy that had been sustaining him draining away abruptly. 'At least you're talking about getting them help and not handing them powerful artefacts,' he said.
Sigyn looked over at him with a slight frown, but she was too tired to get angry with him again and really didn't want to. And they did still need to talk about that. "I think the only one that would help is the casket, and whatever else he might be doing, I don't think Loki's namesake is going to hand that over. Hod was a different situation." Although, as it had turned out, still a bad idea.
'You should have told us,' said Vali, scowling at her. 'Even if you didn't trust Odin, you should have told me and Nari and Leikin. Not just decided only you and Father knew what to do.'
'We barely saw any of you during that time,' Sigyn pointed out. 'And when we knew where you were, it generally involved a battle. Or the preparation or aftermath. Or you were with Odin. Or several of the above.' In Leikin's case, she'd sometimes been with Baldr. Sigyn leaned back and pressed her fingertips up into her eyebrows.
'Did you really think we would help Odin with plans to conquer Midgard?'
'Did you really think we would want Asgard destroyed?' Sigyn shot back. Vali's mouth tightened, and her shoulders slumped. 'We were not fair to you,' she said quietly.
Vali looked startled, as if he hadn't expected the concession. 'I didn't know what you'd intended,' he said. 'It never occurred to me that you would hide something done with good intentions from the rest of us. It was easier to believe you'd betrayed us than that you'd trusted us that little, however much I wished not to believe either.'
'Things looked very different from where we were," Sigyn said, rather wearily. Weary in general, not of this conversation, however heartsick it made her to hear that. And to think back over the long years of suspicion. 'It seemed entirely plausible, then, that after so much troubl
e Odin had decided to keep Midgard, through Baldr anyway. And that Asgard would go along with the idea. It's not as if we'd exactly balked over Vanaheim.'
'That was before my time,' said Vali. 'I didn't think of how things might look to someone who fought in that.' He scrubbed a hand over his face. 'I liked Hod too. That's part of why I wished you hadn't given him Mistletienn. Maybe Baldr would have killed him sooner without it, but he deserved a better death than he got.'
'He did. And I'm sorry it had to be you. For your sake and... because it added to our misconceptions.' She sighed again. 'I wish we hadn't now, too. We never expected him to get as carried away as he did, and in retrospect we probably should have.' Sigyn fell pensively silent for a moment. 'He and Baldr may have been the only people involved who each thought the other was behaving completely reasonably.'
Vali nodded, sombrely. 'Impossible to blame either of them for using power they were given. They were warriors of their people.'
'Yes.' Sigyn reached over for her son's hand. 'I think,' she said ruefully, 'there is perhaps only so far we can blame Byleist, either. He must have learned of the other worlds mostly from Laufey, after all.'
no subject
Date: 2012-01-30 01:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-30 04:31 pm (UTC)